New York City First Deputy Mayor Randy Mastro signed an executive order Tuesday allowing federal immigration enforcement officials to operate on Rikers Island. 

Mastro said the order would re-establish office space at the prison island for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the FBI, and other federal agencies “solely for criminal investigations, consistent with New York City law, after Mayor Adams delegated all powers and responsibilities related to this topic to me.”

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“This directive is driven by one priority and one priority alone: to keep all New Yorkers safe,” he said in a statement. “The city had a similar arrangement with federal authorities as recently as a decade ago, but this time, the focus will be exclusively on criminal investigations.”

Mastro said that re-establishing the office space will allow the city’s correctional intelligence bureau to “better coordinate on criminal investigations — in particular, those focused on violent transnational criminal gangs — and make our city safer.”

President Donald Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, praised Adams and Mastro on Tuesday evening for opening up Rikers to federal authorities, calling it “a great first step in our continuing collaboration to make NYC even safer as President Trump has committed to.”

Mastro’s move came after New York City Mayor Eric Adams first announced plans in February to authorize ICE to access the Rikers Island jail complex, which is the city’s largest criminal detention center. Adams’s proposal came the same day he met with Homan, who urged the mayor to expand cooperation with federal authorities on the prison island. 

Adams’s February announcement came days after Trump’s Justice Department sought to dismiss a corruption case against the mayor, causing quid pro quo allegations to ensue. This led City Hall to have Mastro sign the final executive order authorizing ICE access to Rikers to avoid further accusations of illegal behavior.

“To maintain trust among the nearly 8.5 million New Yorkers who our administration serves every day, Mayor Adams has delegated all powers and responsibilities related to any executive order to authorize federal officials to investigate potential criminal immigration violations at Rikers Island to First Deputy Mayor Randy Mastro,” Adams press secretary Kayla Mamelak Altus told Politico Playbook.

However, the action wasn’t enough to fend off criticism from New York Democrats, including the speaker of the New York City Council, Adrienne Adams. She called the executive order “deeply concerning,” given its timing, and argued the mayor’s move to cooperate with Trump’s immigration agenda is linked to Judge Dale Ho’s ruling last week, which dismissed his corruption case. 

“This executive order is deeply concerning, particularly given Judge Ho’s recent ruling on Mayor Adams’ corruption case, the attempted quid pro quo, and the series of highly troubling recent events between the Trump administration and our city’s mayor,” the speaker wrote in a statement Tuesday. “It is hard not to see this action as connected to the dismissal of the Mayor’s case and his willingness to cooperate with Trump’s extreme deportation agenda that is removing residents without justification or due process.” 

ERIC ADAMS EXPANDS COOPERATION WITH ICE, SIDELINES NYC SANCTUARY CITY PROTECTIONS

Adams has denied all quid pro quo allegations, arguing that the corruption case brought against him by the Biden administration was dropped by the DOJ simply because it was erroneous. 

The DOJ justified dropping the case by arguing that the previous justice department had weaponized the system against Adams for political reasons due to his resistance to the Biden administration’s relaxed illegal immigration policies. The charges leveled against Adams were inappropriately timed to complicate his hopes for mayoral reelection, a memorandum suggested.